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Zimbabwe rivals in new talks to end deadlock

Reuters

Mon 24 Nov 2008,
23:03 GMT

By Muchena Zigomo

JOHANNESBURG, Nov 25 (Reuters) -
Zimbabwe's political rivals meet in South Africa on Tuesday for talks to end
a political deadlock, amid mounting pressure from regional leaders for a
deal to prevent the humanitarian crisis becoming still
worse.

Negotiators from President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party,
the opposition Movement for Democratic Change and a breakaway MDC faction
will meet former South African President Thabo Mbeki to discuss a draft
constitutional amendment paving the way for a new government.

Mbeki
has been reviewing the draft law, which many in the southern African country
hope will usher in a new government to end a crippling economic crisis that
has seen inflation soar to more than 230 million percent.

The MDC has
refused to enter government, accusing ZANU-PF of trying to take the most
powerful ministries and freeze it out, violating a Sept. 15 power-sharing
deal. Talks on forming a cabinet have been deadlocked for two
months.

The power-sharing agreement may unravel if Mugabe names a
cabinet without MDC agreement, jeopardising what is seen as the best chance
of reversing a decade of gradual economic collapse.

The MDC had
threatened to boycott Tuesday's meeting, but said on Monday it would attend
the talks and aim to address all the issues stalling an
agreement.

"Our team, consistent with the duty and obligation to
represent the people, will attend tomorrow's meeting in South Africa,"
spokesman Nelson Chamisa told Reuters.

"We will not accept any
parochial and reductionist approach that seeks to impose only one item, the
constitutional amendment on us. We all know there is a basket of issues that
have to be tackled collectively."

HUMANITARIAN
DISASTER

Pressure has grown from regional leaders and international aid
agencies for an end to the political stalemate, which has created a huge
humanitarian crisis.

Chronic food shortages and hyperinflation have
led millions of Zimbabweans to flee their country. A cholera epidemic has
killed nearly 300 people and sent hundreds into South Africa to seek
treatment.

Former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and other prominent
world figures described Zimbabwe on Monday as close to a humanitarian
disaster.

Annan urged Southern African Development Community leaders to
put more pressure on Mugabe and the MDC to break the impasse.

"SADC
must bring its full weight to bear," Annan, flanked by former U.S. President
Jimmy Carter and human rights campaigner Graca Machel, wife of Nelson
Mandela, told a news conference.

The three, part of a group called the
Elders, were barred from entering Zimbabwe last weekend on a humanitarian
visit. The government said the trip was unnecessary and denied them
visas.

Carter said the crisis was worse than he had imagined and he felt
southern African leaders did not fully understand the extent of the misery
in the once-prosperous nation.

He said the United Nations, African
Union and SADC should send teams into Zimbabwe to report on the crisis
properly.

South African ruling ANC party leader Jacob Zuma and President
Kgalema Motlanthe have urged a quick end to the crisis.

"The
situation has just gone beyond a situation where we could say 'wait and
see,'" Zuma told reporters on Monday, saying the Elders had told him
Zimbabwe could be months from collapse.

South Africa's cabinet said
last week it would hold back 300 million rand ($28.3 million) earmarked for
agricultural aid to Zimbabwe until a representative government was in
place.

Many critics accuse Mugabe, in power since independence from
Britain in 1980, of ruining the country through his controversial policies.
Mugabe, 84, says forces opposed to his nationalist stance have sabotaged the
economy. (Reporting by Muchena Zigomo; editing by Tim Pearce)

Tsvangirai's MDC To Attend Pretoria Meeting

HARARE, November 24, 2008 -
THE Morgan Tsvangirai led Movement for Democratic Change (MDC -T) on Monday
said its mediators will join ZANU PF and the Aurthur Mutambara (MDC- M)
negotiators in South Africa for a meeting called by Thabo Mbeki, the former
South African president mediating in the Zimbabwe crisis.

Nelson Chamisa, told Radio VOP that Tendai Biti, the chief negotiator in the
crisis, will lead the MDC T in the negotiations but would demand that all
the outstanding issues in the power-sharing agreement be addressed.
"Our team of negotiators is going to South African tomorrow (Tuesday) to
represent the MDC T," he said. "They are mandated to state our very
compelling case. The understanding is that the meeting should resolve all
outstanding issues which have deadlocked the power-sharing agreement. These
outstanding issues should be tackled before the issue of Amendment Number
19. There are well-known outstanding issues the mediator and SADC are privy
of and these need urgent attention and we hope this meeting will once and
for all deal with them," said Chamisa.

There were fears the MDC
T could boycott the meeting after its national executive council rejected
the SADC resolution that Mugabe should proceed and form a coalition
government.The Tuesday meeting is expected to deliberate on the draft
Constitutional Amendment Number 19.Zimbabwe's talks, to form a
coalition government, have remained stalled due to disagreement in
allocation of key ministries. MDC-T is insisting in being given real power
as opposed to being spectators while Mugabe continues to wield
power.

International observers have condenmed the current situation
in Zimbabwe as deplorable as hundreds continue to die from cholera and
hunger in the country, with the highest inflation in the world. Inflation is
estimated to be well above 230 million percent.

Barred From Zimbabwe, but Not Silent

JOHANNESBURG — Zimbabwe’s
president, Robert
Mugabe, 84, managed to keep three members of the Elders,
founded by Nelson
Mandela to tackle intractable problems, out of Zimbabwe over the weekend.
But the members gave Mr. Mugabe and leaders from across southern Africa an
earful on Monday about Zimbabwe’s grave humanitarian crisis and their
responsibility to act more assertively to resolve it.

Kofi
Annan, the former United
Nations secretary general, bluntly told the heads of state in the 15-nation
regional bloc, the Southern African Development Community, which is often
accused of coddling Mr. Mugabe, “It’s obvious that S.A.D.C. could have and
should have done more.”

Graça Machel, a women’s rights advocate who is married to Mr. Mandela, said
after three days of listening to stories of heartbreak from Zimbabwe in
conversations here with refugees and others, “Either the leadership doesn’t have
a clear picture of the suffering of their own people, or they don’t care.”

Former President Jimmy
Carter suggested that heads of state in the region had no clue about the
extreme hardships in Zimbabwe, while Zimbabwe’s leaders were callous. He said
the African
Union and the United Nations should send teams to document the situation
inside the country. “We all have the feeling leaders of S.A.D.C. do not know
what is going on in Zimbabwe,” he said.

Their remarks are likely to sting Mr. Mugabe, in power for 28 years. Ms.
Machel’s and Mr. Carter’s connections to him go back decades.

Ms. Machel’s first marriage was to Samora Machel, the Mozambican leader who
fought Portuguese rule and led his newly independent nation until he died in a
plane crash in 1986. She said in an interview that she had been close with Mr.
Mugabe and his wife, Sally, until Mrs. Mugabe died in 1992.

The relationship “became even more aloof” after Ms. Machel married Mr.
Mandela, she said. “Mugabe was the star of this region before South Africa
became free,” Ms. Machel said. “By the time South Africa became free, the whole
attention of the world turns to South Africa. That was an issue.”

Mr. Carter, 84, said in an interview that as president, he supported the end
of white minority rule in Zimbabwe, called Rhodesia at the time. He recalled a
White House event celebrating Mr. Mugabe’s rise to power before Mr. Carter left
office in 1981.

Mr. Mugabe “held my hand up in front of the whole crowd and said, ‘This is
the only man that might beat me in an election in Zimbabwe,’ ” Mr. Carter
recalled.

Mr. Mugabe is sensitive to criticism, and these comments are likely to gall
him. The Herald, his state-owned mouthpiece, quoted an anonymous source last
week as saying that Mr. Annan had been openly critical of Mr. Mugabe. A Herald
editorial on Monday accused Mr. Annan, as it has other African leaders who
differed with Mr. Mugabe, of “putting himself at the beck and call of the white
West.”

The three in the Elders contingent on Zimbabwe sounded an alarm on Monday
about the rapidly deteriorating living conditions there. They spent the past few
days meeting with Zimbabwe’s opposition leaders and South Africa’s president,
Kgalema Motlanthe, as well as aid workers, Western diplomats, United Nations
representatives and Zimbabweans who had fled their homeland.

At the start of their visit on Saturday, the three leaders said they were on
a humanitarian mission. They ended the trip on Monday by saying that Zimbabwe’s
collapsing public services — health, education, sanitation, water — could not be
fixed until a power-sharing deal between Mr. Mugabe and the opposition leader,
Morgan
Tsvangirai, took effect and the country had a functioning government
again.

Negotiators for Mr. Mugabe and Mr. Tsvangirai are expected to meet again on
Tuesday as South Africa’s former president, Thabo
Mbeki, the mediator in the Zimbabwe crisis, seeks to persuade them to form a
collaborative government more than two months after they signed an agreement to
do so.

“S.A.D.C. must bring its full weight to bear to ensure the agreement is fully
implemented,” Mr. Annan said.

Under the deal, Mr. Mugabe would remain president, while Mr. Tsvangirai would
become prime minister. But they have been feuding over how to divide the most
powerful ministries, and particularly over control of the police force, an
engine of Mr. Mugabe’s repressive rule. The Southern African Development
Community has directed them to share management of the ministry that oversees
the police.

Mr. Tsvangirai won the March presidential election, but not by enough to
avert a runoff, which he quit because of state-sponsored attacks on the
opposition.

Mr. Mbeki has for years been criticized for his quiet diplomacy on Zimbabwe.
South Africa’s new leaders were somewhat noisier on Monday. Jacob
Zuma, Mr. Mbeki’s archrival and successor as president of the African
National Congress, was evenhanded in his comments on the power-sharing
negotiations, but after meeting Mr. Annan, Mr. Carter and Ms. Machel, he said
the decision by Zimbabwean authorities not to grant them visas “does give an
unfortunate picture.”

President Motlanthe of South Africa, chairman of the regional development
group, said his government had tried to speak to Mr. Mugabe about letting the
three visit Zimbabwe, and was told that Mr. Mugabe was out of town and would get
back to them on his return. “He didn’t come back to us,” Mr. Motlanthe said.

After meeting Mr. Annan, Mr. Carter and Ms. Machel, Mr. Motlanthe agreed that
without a political settlement and the formation of a legitimate government, the
situation in Zimbabwe “may implode or collapse
altogether.”

The Big Question: Who are the Elders, and can they do anything to resolve
world crises?

The political and humanitarian crisis in Zimbabwe has dropped off the news
agenda in recent months, as events there have stagnated and reverted to the
deeply depressing status quo. In an attempt to change that, a group of
influential world leaders who have now left their public offices arranged a
visit.

The group – known as the Global Elders – had intended to draw attention to
food shortages and a cholera outbreak. But on Saturday, just when the visit was
supposed to begin, the delegation issued a statement saying that it had been
barred from Zimbabwe by the Mugabe regime, which refused to issue them visas.
That snub has led to questions about the nature of their influence in world
affairs – and what good, if any, they can do.

Who are the Elders?

The Elders are a kind of political dream team, a dozen of the most widely
respected world leaders alive today, whose glittering CVs and unimpeachable
commitment to human rights are supposed to open doors that would remain closed
to less feted figures. Their figurehead is secular saint Nelson Mandela; the
group also includes Jimmy Carter, Kofi Annan, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former
Irish president and UN Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, and, in
absentia, Burmese democracy activist Aung Sun Suu Kyi. The group may well have
the highest concentration of Nobel prize-winners in the world, with five of its
12 members recipients of the honour.

What are they for?

The idea is that they can exert influence and bring attention to humanitarian
crises that might otherwise go unnoticed or unsolved. Between the 12 of them,
they command access to an unrivalled network of leaders that, in theory, means
that they can make a difference in contexts where other means like governmental
interventions might have failed.

The whole group meets twice a year, and smaller delegations travel to
crisis-ridden areas in the hope of finding solutions. Jimmy Carter argues that
the group can "fill an existing void in the world community." "Almost impervious
to the consequences of outside criticism," he says, they have "opportunities for
unrestrained analysis of important and complex issues, the evolution of
suggestions, and for sharing our ideas with the general public and with others
who might take action to resolve problems."

How did the Elders come together?

By the good offices of supreme entrepreneur Richard Branson and music pioneer
Peter Gabriel. In 1999, the two men had a conversation about the potential
benefit of an organisation that followed the "village elders" model of
influence, whereby the wisdom of the most senior members of a community carries
great weight.

Branson, who had got to know Mandela, broached the idea to him in 2001; and
the group formally launched in April last year, with $18m in initial funding
that Branson and Gabriel helped to raise. Since then they have worked in Cyprus,
Sudan, Kenya, and the Middle East.

Can the model work?

The jury is still out: the group, unlike its members, is very young. It is
hard to draw firm conclusions when the Elders' work is always bound to be most
effective in the margins, in ways that may not always be obvious to the external
observer. "I think their influence could be limited," says Josephine Osikena,
Democracy and Development programme manager at the Foreign Policy Centre. "But
because they're international elder statespeople, there is some kind of effect.
Perhaps they can intervene and discuss in ways that the UK government, for
example, can't, because it would be seen as antagonistic."

What evidence of their effectiveness is there?

The relative success of the group's mission to Kenya might be seen as an
example of how they can function effectively. The arrival of Kofi Annan et al in
January this year was by no means a panacea after violent clashes followed the
last election there, and the group could not offer any incentives beyond the
weight of their names and experience to the negotiating parties. But, says Sally
Healy, Associate Fellow of the Africa Programme at Chatham House, their sheer
presence had a calming effect. "They helped to 'freeze' the situation," she
says, "and they created a sense that stuff was happening, and so you didn't have
to go and fight today."

Their influence, adds Healy, can be particularly powerful in Africa, where
government is much more reliant on personal relationships than the kind of
systematic approach more prevalent in the West, and where the village elders
model is culturally significant. "Someone we might regard as an old has-been
might be seen in a different context in Kenya or Zimbabwe," she says. "It's
partly to do with tradition, and it's partly weak institutions."

And can they havea negative impact?

Possibly. Many are sceptical of what one newspaper editorial said might be
referred to as a "makework scheme for ex-leaders who cannot let go". In Israel,
some saw their role as a distraction: "This is not a conflict where people lack
heroic leadership," said Robert Satloff, executive director of the Washington
Institute for Near East Policy. "These are not issues that tend to lend
themselves to whatever these otherwise distinguished stastesmen can contribute."

Earlier this year the Israeli government turned down an offer to mediate a
ceasefire with Hamas, with the country's UN ambassador Dan Gillerman saying that
"nothing good could come out of this initiative". And, according to Sally Healy,
"it would be very foolish to put your eggs in the old boys' mediating network
basket without the hard-edged government diplomacy as well."

What happenedin Zimbabwe?

Zanu-PF seems to have made a calculation that the negative PR that will
result from denying the Elders' access will be less damaging to the regime than
letting them in to observe and condemn the government's failure to help people
who are starving to death. Mugabe has attempted to cast the group as Western
stooges lacking the moral authority to cast judgement in Zimbabwe. (The
Zimbabwean government also says that they are only postponing the trip, and that
it will take place at a later date, though few believe it.) The Elders' argument
that they are not coming to Zimbabwe with a political purpose but a humanitarian
one has fallen on stony ground – particularly in the light of previous
condemnation of the Mugabe regime by Desmond Tutu, among others.

So can the Elders stillhave an influence there?

Paradoxically, it may be that Mugabe's decision will actually increase their
long-term influence. It confers a sense that the group are capable of meaningful
action – why ban anyone whose words would have no consequences? – and raises the
profile of the situation in Zimbabwe in a way that might otherwise have been
impossible.

The Elders are continuing to work in neighbouring South Africa, and their
statements in the aftermath of their ban have emphasised the non-partisan,
humanitarian good that they seek to do." "We need no red-carpet treatment from
the government of Zimbabwe," said Mr Annan. "We seek no permission other than
permission to help the poor and the desperate."

Can the Elders succeed in changing things for the better?

Yes...

*Their connections are remarkable. They can probably get any politician in
the world on the phone

*There's nothing like Nelson Mandela making his feelings known about an issue
to turn the spotlight on it

*Their separation from governments allows them to pursue what they believe is
right

No...

*Past ties to institutions like the UN means they can be dismissed as agents
of Western influence

*The temporary blast of publicity they can bring doesn't necessarily lead to
tangible results

*The levers available to national governments – like trade sanctions – are
far more influential in the end

According to the ZANU PF mouthpiece....

THE group of "Elders" that wanted to visit Zimbabwe on a
"humanitarian mission" was, in fact, bent on rescuing MDC-T after Sadc
resolved that the inclusive Government should be formed as a matter of
urgency, it has emerged.

The "Elders" mission was part of a grand
plan by Britain and the United States to get the United Nations to intervene
in Zimbabwe and reverse the Sadc resolution.

At its recent meeting in
Sandton, South Africa, Sadc resolved that Zanu-PF and the two MDC formations
should form the inclusive Government with the ruling party and the MDC-T
co-managing the Home Affairs Ministry, which had stalled the establishment
of the inclusive Government.

The "Elders" - former UN secretary-general
Kofi Annan, former US president Jimmy Carter and Graca Machel - were
supposed to produce a damning report on the humanitarian situation in
Zimbabwe.

Such a report would have given the UN Security Council basis to
invoke the "responsibility to protect" clause paving the way for the
aggression and intervention in Zimbabwe by foreign countries.

The
clause allows for foreign intervention or aggression supposedly to save
people whose government is deemed to have neglected its responsibility to
protect them.

"It is a clause for aggression or intervention using
the cover of the UN. The 'Elders' are legitimising instruments of the plot.
The 'Elders' are a Trojan horse for the politics of regime change. The whole
plot was to reverse the setback suffered by the MDC in Sandton and sideline
the Sadc resolution," a political observer said.

The plot to involve
the UN is confirmed by last Thursday's briefing to the Security Council by
UN assistant secretary-general Haile Menkerios, two days before the "Elders"
visit to Harare.

In his damning briefing, Menkerios called for more
involvement of the UN in implementing the power-sharing agreement in
Zimbabwe.

"The Secretary-General is ready to accompany Zimbabwe in this
process, and calls on the parties, regional organisations and other
stakeholders to start consultations with the United Nations with a view to
agreeing on a framework for the UN's engagement in Zimbabwe in support of
the proper implementation of the September 15 agreement," said
Menkerios.

He also called on the Zimbabwean Government to give full
access to the planned mission of the "Elders".

Secretary for
Information and Publicity Cde George Charamba yesterday said the "Elders"
mission had nothing to do with the humanitarian situation in
Zimbabwe.

"The so-called 'Elders' are a creature of pro-Labour
British corporate interests. There is nothing elderly about them. But what
is more, it is a very condescenting title. If they are 'Elders' what do
Zimbabweans become, infants?" he said.

Cde Charamba said the "Elders"
should not pretend to have Zimbabweans at heart when, in fact, they were
fronting a regime change agenda being pushed by Britain and the
US.

"Annan has been in South Africa several times, Graca lives in South
Africa and are beginning now to find a Methodist church where Zimbabwean
refugees live. People should not seek to make big names for themselves using
Zimbabwe.

"Annan has on no occasion denounced the illegal Western
sanctions against Zimbabwe despite repeated appeals by the Zimbabwean
President. Annan refused to his last day in office (as UN secretary-general)
to denounce the sanctions, but now pretends to be concerned about a
humanitarian crisis he knows can be traced to sanctions he condoned as UN
secretary-general. These (Elders) are glory seekers and we treat them as
such," he said.

Cde Charamba also dismissed the notion that former US
leader Carter supported Zimbabwe's liberation struggle, an argument being
pushed to give credence to his involvement with the "Elders" group in
Zimbabwe.

"Carter never supported the Patriotic Front, no American
president could ever do that. What Carter did - and we commend him for that
- was to realise that the white settler community which the United States
supported was about to be overrun by the Patriotic Front forces and what was
needed was a rescue package for the embattled white community. That is why
the US stepped in to save the Lancaster House deal by offering funds to
support land reform in Zimbabwe," he said.

The US never supported the
sanctions against the Rhodesian settler regime and the Carter administration
defended Rhodesia by ensuring the exclusion of chrome from the sanctions so
the US could continue accessing the chrome.

Recent statements by US
President George Bush, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga and MDC-T leader
Morgan Tsvangirai dovetailed into the planned "Elders" mission and the
predicted collapse of the Zanu-PF Government in two months.

Bush,
while on a visit to Peru at the weekend to deal with the global financial
crisis, spared a moment to issue a statement on Zimbabwe about the stalled
power-sharing deal.

Odinga called for the sending of an African Union
force to Zimbabwe while Tsvangirai eyed an inclusive Government would be in
place in Zimbabwe in "two months' time".

"The government envisaged by
Tsvangirai was not an inclusive Government, but his government following
the

expected collapse of the Zanu-PF government," a political analyst
said.

The whole plot, according to observers, was to sideline the Sadc
resolution made in Sandton, South Africa.

But Sadc is pushing ahead
with its mediator Cde Thabo Mbeki expected to meet Zanu-PF and the MDC today
to discuss Constitutional Amendment Number 19 to give legal effect to the
power-sharing agreement while a Sadc investigating team is already in
Zimbabwe to probe Harare's claims that the MDC-T was training bandits to
destabilise the country.

The idea of an "Elders" group was mooted by
British singer Peter Gabriel and British businessman Richard Branson to
"offer collective experience, and above all their independent voices to
support the resolution of conflict, to seek new approaches to easing human
suffering and to give voice to those who struggle to be heard".

But
analysts say the idea is basically a British plan to use corporates to push
their agendas where they have failed diplomatically and politically.

Rebuffed By Harare, Annan & Elders Pursue Zimbabwe Rescue
Mission

The delegation of Elders led by former United Nations
Secretary-General Kofi Annan that was rebuffed this weekend by the
Zimbabwean government will pursue its proposed mission in the country aiming
to promote and coordinate international aid to mitigate an "intolerable" and
deepening humanitarian crisis, Annan told VOA in an
interview.

Annan's delegation of so-called Elders, which includes former
U.S. President Jimmy Carter and human rights advocate Graça Machel, had
proposed to visit Zimbabwe on Saturday and Sunday to assess the burgeoning
humanitarian crisis, but was fended off by the government of President
Robert Mugabe which refused to grant entry visas to the three.Since then
Annan and his fellow Elders have resolved to pursue their mission from
outside Zimbabwe's borders. They met Monday with South African President
Kgalema Motlanthe, who warned that unless Zimbabwean political leaders
overcame their differences and form a unity government quickly, "the
situation will get worse and may implode and collapse."

In an
interview, Annan told reporter Blessing Zulu of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe
that the humanitarian crisis "is something the government has not been able
to deal with alone," therefore the Elders propose to provide a catalyst or
spur to international action.

The Harare government "has not come out
plainly to say that they cannot handle it and they need assistance, but the
fact is the U.N. agencies and the international community have been
supporting the Zimbabwean people over the past couple of years, and this of
course is bound to continue and we expect it will get much worse by
January-February."

He noted the U.N. food agencies have predicted that by
the first quarter of 2009 some 5.1 million Zimbabweans - half the population
- will need food aid to fend off starvation.

"So regardless of what
the government says it has done, it does need help from the outside and the
U.N. agencies do need help from donors, and this is the contribution we are
here to make, to make sure people understand what is going on, that the
donor community is energized, and we sustain the effort," Annan told
VOA.

"Our concern is the people," Annan said. "It is intolerable that the
people of Zimbabwe should find themselves in this situation."

Jimmy Carter
says Zimbabwe crisis is 'much worse' than imagined

Carter, part of a
delegation including former U.N. chief Kofi Annan that was denied access to
Zimbabwe, says Zimbabwean leader Robert Mugabe continues to deny his nation
food, other aid.By Robyn DixonNovember 25, 2008Reporting from
Johannesburg, South Africa -- Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter on Monday
said Zimbabwe's humanitarian crisis was far worse than he could have
imagined and expressed dismay that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and
his government refused to acknowledge the problem even existed.

"The
entire basic structure in education, healthcare, feeding people, social
services and sanitation has broken down," Carter told a news conference in
Johannesburg, South Africa. "These are all indications that the crisis in
Zimbabwe is much greater, much worse than we had ever
imagined."

Carter was part of a delegation denied entry into Zimbabwe
last week to assess the crisis. The delegation members also included U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Graça Machel, the wife of former South
African President Nelson Mandela.

An estimated 4.9 million people in
Zimbabwe are desperately in need of food aid and 300 have died in a cholera
epidemic.

The delegates are from a group of prominent public figures
known as The Elders, set up by Mandela to address serious crises around the
world. Instead of traveling to Mugabe's nation, they held meetings in
neighboring South Africa with Zimbabwean refugees and opposition leaders,
South African government officials, diplomats, humanitarian agencies and
nongovernmental organizations.

Citing those briefings, Carter
said Mugabe and his government had refused to meet with the United Nations
and charitable organizations as well as ambassadors from the major donor
countries for the last year. "I think it's the established policy of the
Mugabe government that there's no crisis in Zimbabwe," he said.

He
said this year's planting season had been squandered because there was no
seed available. The earliest possible harvest now is April 2010; farmers
would need to be planting now to catch the rains for next spring's harvest.
"Meanwhile people are suffering from lack of food, which is the most
critical need at this time."

He said none of the four main hospitals
in Zimbabwe was working and only 20% of children were attending school,
compared with 80% last year. The main reason was that teachers stopped
showing up for work because salaries, about $1 a month, did not even cover
their transportation costs.

South African President Kgalema Motlanthe
said the crisis was so serious that Zimbabwe could implode and collapse. He
said the root cause was the lack of a legitimate government.

Mugabe,
opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and the leader of a small opposition
group, Arthur Mutambara, agreed in September to share power following
disputed elections, but soon after, Mugabe allocated the most powerful
Cabinet jobs to his party, ZANU-PF. South African leaders have been putting
intense pressure on Tsvangirai's party to accept those appointments, which
would leave the Zimbabwean leader in control of the military and
intelligence services while sharing police with the
opposition.

Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change, or MDC, argues
that it would not be able to solve the humanitarian crisis with Mugabe and
his security forces still dominating the nation.

Annan said regional
leaders, who belong to the Southern African Development Community, had been
slow to act as the crisis unfolded, particularly after African observers
condemned elections in June.

But he also ratcheted up the pressure on
Tsvangirai, saying that if Zimbabwe's leaders put the interests of the
people first, they'd draw the right conclusions on what was most
important.

"We have indicated to [the opposition leaders] that the most
important issue is the lives and suffering of the people and that must be
paramount," Annan said. "I'm sure we would have given the same message to
President Mugabe if we'd met him."

Tsvangirai's spokesman, George
Sibotshiwe, said it was wrong to blame the MDC for Zimbabwe's
crisis.

"The person who's responsible for the mess is Robert Mugabe," he
said. "He's been in power for 28 years."

"We have to approach the
problem in a sober and realistic way with due consideration of the long
term," he added. "If the MDC rushes into government and they're unable to
provide solutions, the humanitarian situation will get worse."

Zimbabwe
Health Crisis "A Disaster of Unimaginable Proportions"

Jirair
RatevosianPosted November 24, 2008Imagine for just a moment hospitals
shutting down in downtown Los Angeles, dead bodies sprinkled over Sunset
Boulevard, free-flowing water and electricity a figment of the imagination
and Governor Schwarzenegger intentionally blocking humanitarian relief and
food aid into the crumbling state. Something so unimaginable can never
happen in this day and age, right? Wrong.

Zimbabwe, a county of 13
million people in southern Africa has been on the brink of collapse for some
time now. However, just over the last two weeks, a complete collapse of the
health system and sanitation infrastructure has given way to a major cholera
epidemic spreading throughout the country, and a breakdown in delivery of
medications for HIV-AIDS, TB, malaria and chronic illness.

The
government's obstructionism is speeding up the massive loss of life. Just
this weekend, a group including former U.N. chief Kofi Annan and former U.S.
President Carter had to cancel a humanitarian assessment visit to Zimbabwe
when the Mugabe government refused them visas, making travel to the country
impossible. The New York Times reported that "Mr. Mugabe's decision to
forbid a visit by (the group), was a measure of the Zimbabwean leader's
disdain for international opinion at a time when deepening hunger, raging
hyperinflation and the collapse of health, sanitation and education services
have crippled Zimbabwe".

The situation is so out of hand that health
workers from Harare Central and Parirenyatwa Hospitals took the courageous
step of publicly protesting this week against the state of the public health
system. They gathered in the street, calling for an urgent response to the
situation. However, riot police forcefully dispersed the hundreds of
doctors, nurses and other health workers who had assembled to protest poor
salaries and working conditions. In fact, according to this BBC report, riot
police sealed the exits of the country's main referral hospital,
Parirenyatwa, to prevent staff including doctors, specialists, nurses and
engineers from marching into the city center. "Undeterred by such threats,
we continued marching but we were thoroughly beaten by the members of the
police force which effectively ended the demonstration, but we believe our
voices were heard!" said one Information Officer for the Zimbabwe Health
Students' Network.

The health situation in Zimbabwe, which has been
declining for years, is now untenable. Public health workers in Harare
report that due to lack of medicine, equipment, services, and staff, public
hospitals and clinics are essentially closed, resulting in preventable
deaths. There is no access to care for those who cannot afford private
clinics. The only maternity hospital in the capital is also closed. Patients
with fractures, meningitis and other acute and dangerous conditions are
being sent home, according to another medical source.

According to
the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights, a non-partisan and
non-political professional association for doctors and other health
professionals in Zimbabwe, authorities closed indefinitely the country's
most prominent medical school and sent students away. Essential medicines
are unavailable to treat the very diseases that the government's gross
negligence has exacerbated. Anti-retroviral therapy for HIV/AIDS patients
and TB treatment for chronically ill patients has been severely
disrupted.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs,
Jendayi Frazer, reproached the Harare government for failing to maintain the
health infrastructure. The deteriorating water and sanitation system has led
to a cholera epidemic spreading throughout the country and daily death tolls
are on the rise. Nearly 300 people have died in Zimbabwe in recent weeks in
the cholera outbreak which has hit about 6,000 people, the The World Health
Organization told the BBC last Friday.

Fresh water is no longer
pumped into urban areas, which will only exacerbate the spread of this
infectious disease caused by contaminated water. One doctor at Harare
hospital described the situation as a "disaster of unimaginable
proportions."

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), in a press release
issued on November 19 stated, "Given the continued gross negligence of the
government of Zimbabwe and the callous disregard for the safety and
wellbeing of its citizens, together with the dire signs of impending lethal
epidemic disease, the Zimbabwe government must admit its failure to manage
the national health system and seek assistance from the international
community." The organization is calling on governments of the world to act
with the utmost urgency. PHR is circulating a petition this week to urge
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to take decisive action
immediately.

Diplomatic isolation and economic sanctions against the
Mugabe regime have thus far failed to curtail widespread and systematic
human rights violations including willful denial of health care and
obstruction of humanitarian aid as well as mass killing, forced
displacement, torture and arbitrary arrest. The current government has acted
with impunity and must be held to account. "We have been left uncertain of
our future which we have sweated for all these years and hopes of
emancipating ourselves have been shattered," stated the Information Officer
for Zimbabwe Health Students' Network.

Zim city out of water chemicals as cholera spreads

BULAWAYO -
Zimbabwe's second largest city said on Monday it had less than a month's
supply of water treatment chemicals, as cholera ravages the crisis-ridden
country while South Africa called for urgent action to prevent the total
collapse of its northern neighbour.

Bulawayo mayor Thabiso Moyo told
ZimOnline that an acute shortage of foreign currency has left the city of
more than one million people unable to secure enough water treatment
chemicals.

"The water treatment chemicals will last less than a month and
if we fail to source foreign currency then we will run out of the chemicals
by mid-next month," said Moyo.

"In the face of the cholera outbreak,
there is no way we can give residents dirty and untreated water, the council
will stop pumping water to residents until chemicals have been sourced," he
said.

Zimbabwean cities, attempting to juggle the needs of good services
against falling revenues after years of recession, have battled to provide
water and refuse collection while the country is subject to frequent power
cuts, a result of a severe foreign currency squeeze.

A cholera
outbreak blamed on broken down sewers, uncollected garbage and a shortage of
clean drinking water in Zimbabwe's cities has claimed 294 lives to date and
has shown signs it could spill over to neighbouring countries with at least
three deaths reported in South Africa since last week.

Both South African
President Kgalema Motlanthe and the leader of that country's ruling ANC
party, Jacob Zuma, said on Monday that the cholera outbreak showed the need
for Zimbabwe's political parties to resolve a two-month impasse that has
blocked the establishment of a unity government.

"Unless the root cause
of the political absence of a legitimate government is solved, the
humanitarian situation will get worse and will implode or collapse
altogether," Motlanthe said after a meeting a delegation of international
statesmen led by former United Nations Secretary General Kofi
Annan.

Annan, former US President Jimmy Carter and Nelson Mandela's
wife Graca Machel - who are part of a group of international statesman known
as the Elders Group - had to cancel a visit to Zimbabwe at the weekend after
they were denied entry into the country.

But they have remained in
the region, meeting key leaders to discuss Zimbabwe's escalating
humanitarian crisis.

Speaking after meeting Annan's group, Zuma urged
Zimbabwe's rival political leaders to reach agreement on a new government
when they meet in South Africa this week.

He said: "The situation has
just gone beyond a situation where we could say 'wait and see'. We are
pleading to the leadership for the sake of the people to find a solution
that would help them move forward."

Representatives of Mugabe's ruling
ZANU PF party and the two formations of the opposition Movement for
Democratic Change (MDC) party are expected to meet in South Africa this week
to discuss a draft constitutional bill that would allow Mugabe to form a
unity government outlined under a September 15 power-sharing
agreement.

The power-sharing accord has stalled as the main formation of
the MDC led by Morgan Tsvangirai and ZANU PF fight over control of key
ministries, distribution of gubernatorial posts, ambassadorships and other
top government posts.

Analysts say a power-sharing government could
help ease the political situation and allow Zimbabweans to focus on tackling
an economic crisis marked by the world's highest inflation rate of 231
million percent, severe shortages of food and basic commodities. -
ZimOnline

Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) has not given up on
negotiations for a government of national unity

November 21,
2008

by Peta Thornycroft

Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic
Change (MDC) has not given up on negotiations for a government of national
unity.

Four major SADC member states originally backed its call for
sole control of the contested home affairs ministry until only one remained
and then conceded grudgingly to "consensus" at the Sandton SADC summit
last weekend.

Independent Newspapers has pieced together what
happened at the meeting and where the negotiations over the crisis-hit
country will go next.

When SADC leaders met in Sandton at the MDC's
request, Tanzania's foreign minister, Bernard Membe, passionately called for
Morgan Tsvanigirai's MDC to be awarded sole control of home affairs
.

He argued that Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF was getting the other
security ministry, defence, as well as control of the feared Central
Intelligence Organisation even though the MDC won a tiny parliamentary
majority in March.

Tanzania was supported by Botswana, Lesotho and
Zambia, according to sources in the meeting. The smaller MDC party's leader,
Arthur Mutambara, supported Tsvangirai's claim.

Zanu PF argued
that as the party of liberation it had to have all security ministries and
let it be known that it feared that if Tsvangirai controlled the police, the
MDC could use the force for revenge arrests, particularly Zanu PF corruption
and of course for violent attacks against the MDC over eight
years.

As Sunday faded into a long night, South Africa's acting
foreign minister, Charles Ngqakula (sp??) proposed the compromise, arguing
that sharing home affairs could become a super ministry and try and build
trust between the two parties and give rank and file policemen an
alternative to misuse by one party or the other.

After further debate,
the Zambians were persuaded. Botswana only conceded, reluctantly, at the end
of the summit, that it would be a signatory to a "consensus" summit
statement.

In the debate surrounding the allocation of ministries,
Lesotho raised the point that while Mugabe had got the coercive ministries
he insisted on, Tsvangirai had won control of service delivery portfolios,
which was argued at one point, could be seen to be unfair to Zanu
PF.

Within two years, if the transitional Government of National
Unity is established, and a new constitution agreed, then properly
supervised elections will provide a government based on the people's
will.

Tsvangirai's MDC hope to use control of social services,
supported by donor funds to provide food, health and other desperately
needed social services to a suffering population.

With Zanu PF's
gross misgovernance and corruption replaced in part by service delivery,
Tsvanigrai should easily deliver a decisive MDC parliamentary majority
rather than the present hung parliament in which he depends on Mutambara's
10 MP's to defeat Zanu PF.

If Tsvangirai gets his way the two MDC's
would be reunited ahead of the next election and would win an easy two
thirds majority and Tsvangirai would breeze through to presidential
victory.

On Friday the MDC-T issued an ambiguous statement that some
analysts interpret as a decision to accept the dual-minister compromise if a
proposed constitutional amendment is passed.

Zimbabwe political
commentator Alex Magaisa says: "The MDC had a clear choice of rejecting the
option of joining the inclusive government but they did not take it
expressly."

"The MDC has been careful to say that they reject the two
communiqués by the SADC Troika (October 28) and the Summit (November 9.) But
to what extent have they actually 'rejected' them?"

Magaisa says
that the key is in paragraph 3 of the MDC's Friday
statement:

"...the MDC shall participate in a new government once
Constitutional Amendment No. 19 has been passed and effected into
law". The word "shall" rather than "may" indicates that providing the
constitutional amendment needed to ground a GNU in law is agreed, the MDC
will take part, he says, and others believe this will include sharing the
disputed super ministry, home affairs, which controls the
police.

The six negotiatiors, from MDC, Zanu PF and the smaller MDC
could meet soon to hammer out the constitutional amendment. . It has been
drafted by the Attorney-general's office in Harare and sent to the
facilitator, former President Thabo Mbeki.

The MDC has drafted
its own version of the amendment so the two will have to be negotiatied.
Tsvangirai is likely to want some of the imperfections of the September 15
agreement corrected, so may use this opportunity to ensure that there is
equitable appointment of top civil service jobs.

It may be in these
negotiations that composition of the new National Security Council takes
place. As it stands it is not a statutory body but is made up of service
chiefs, now known as the Joint Operations Command.

The agreement does
not spell out its composition, and Tsvangirai, who the agreement says
would be a member, would be massively outnumbered by the pro Zanu PF
service chiefs.

If an amendment is then agreed and addresses some of
the specific imperfections of the Global Political Agreement of September15,
such as a fair methodology for allocation of top civil service jobs, then
it would be gazetted and President Robert Mugabe would then swear in the
two other signatories to the September 15 political
agreement:

Morgan Tsvangirai, as prime minister and Arthur Mutambara,
leader of the smaller MDC, a deputy.

Then, a month later as the
constitution demands, the amendment would have to be passed by a two thirds
parliamentary majority and the second deputy prime minister, Thoko Khupe,
(Tsvangirai's vice president) would be sworn in and then the cabinet,
agreed by consensus by SADC on November 9.

ADC executive secretary
Tomaz Salomao has accepted that the position of 10 powerful governors is
still up for negotiations and told the post summit press conference these
posts will have to be handled after the government is sworn
in.

The MDC says they must be distributed based on March 29 election
results. SADC ought to endorse a fair allocation of governors' since its
observers accepted the results of the March 29 election which Tsvangirai's
MDC won with a single seat majority.

However Mugabe will resist
as he installed Zanu PF governors ahead of the agreement to give his party a
majority in the Senate which is unacceptable to both
MDC's

Repression of MDC leaders and ordinary supporters for eight
years has taken a toll on the MDC leadership, leading to personal and policy
disagreements.Tsvangirai, has from the beginning of negotiations, appeared
to instinctively want to have a go at a GNU, according to those who watched
him during all the talks.

However, whenever he came close to
signing a deal during negotiations for allocation of the ministries, he
withdrew to consult and was pulled back by key supporters, and he then
introduced new bottom lines.

He is answerable to a group of party
advisors including his volatile secretary-general, Tendai Biti, a senior and
respected partner of a top Harare law firm.

Before the power
sharing agreement was signed, Tsvangirai ensured that the top structure of
the GNU would be limited to two deputy prime ministers, one for his party
deputy, Khupe, and the other to the unelected Mutambara, effectively, and
some say, strategically, leaving Biti out.

At that point, insiders
say Biti influenced some key intellectuals against participating in a
GNU.

Against all this, negotiations' facilitator, Thabo Mbeki has
long been accused by the MDC of shielding Mugabe. But Mbeki's "quiet
diplomacy," however irritating, did allow him to become the mediator
acceptable to Mugabe, even if mistrusted by Tsvangirai.

In
private, one on one, we do not know whether Mbeki exercised pressure on
Mugabe, but he must have put some heat on the old man, or there would have
been no negotiations at all.

Several sources close to Mbeki say
his approach to Zimbabwe is dominated by an obsession with "imperialist"
Britain and the United States and a suspicion for some obscure reason that
they are using the MDC as their agents (witting or
unwittingly).

Mbeki also seems to have little respect for Tsvangirai,
possibly because of the latter's lack of tertiary education, perhaps
forgetting that the MDC leader is closer to the grass roots of Zimbabwe than
Mbeki ever was in South Africa.

Mbeki has also been irritated by
Tsvangirai's frequent change of mind during negotiations and his failure to
turn up for a meeting with Mugabe earlier in the year, which he,
Tsvangirai, had repeatedly asked for.

MDC leaders find it hard to
understand Mbeki's obsession with "imperialism," in the face of the much
larger issue of the collapse of Zimbabwe and the unimaginable human
suffering throughout the country.

With increasing hunger, in some
places on the point of starvation which will be worse in the coming months,
the self-interest and ideological obsessions of politicians is beginning to
look obscene.

SA
says over 1 000 cholera patients in Beitbridge, Musina

JOHANNESBURG - More than 1 000 cholera patients are in Beitbridge hospital,
while Musina hospital has received a total of 168 Zimbabwean cholera
patients since the outbreak of the disease, South African health officials
said on Monday.

"As at yesterday, our hospital in Musina had
received a total of 168 cholera patients since the outbreak of the disease
on November 15, three of whom have died," Musina municipality health
department spokesperson Phuti Seloba told the media, adding that 27 patients
were currently in the hospital.

Seloba said South African and
Zimbabwean health officials met at the weekend to map out a strategy to
tackle a cholera outbreak that is wreaking havoc in crisis-ravaged Zimbabwe
and fast spreading into South Africa's northernmost province.

"We had a meeting on Sunday with health officials from Zimbabwe. It was a
very fruitful meeting. We did an assessment of Zimbabwe's health needs to
enable us to tackle the problem," Seloba said.

"During the meeting,
held in the Zimbabwean border town of Beitbridge, we all realised that the
problem is neither Zimbabwean nor South African. This is our common problem
and we need to solve it jointly. We need to look at the health gaps and find
a way to fill them by tackling the source of the problem."

Zimbabwe - facing a serious humanitarian crisis with more than half of the
population facing starvation and a world record inflation of more than 231
million percent - has been battling to contain an outbreak of cholera that
started in September and, according to the World Health Organisation, has
since claimed 294 lives.

Compounding the humanitarian crisis in
Zimbabwe is the fact that the country's once admired health system has
totally collapsed while doctors and nurses are grossly underpaid because the
government does not have money. - ZimOnline

Residents
sue ZINWA over cholera deaths

HARARE - More than 100 residents of Harare's Budiriro
suburb and Chitungwiza are filing a law suit and claiming damages of up to
$2 hexilion against the Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) over the
cholera epidemic which has claimed the lives of their relatives.

The
lawsuit will be filed in the High Court in Harare this week by law firm
Mucheche and Matsikidze Legal Practioners, acting on behalf of the
residents.

The lawsuit seeks to have ZINWA relieved of its
responsibilities for having failed to provide safe and clean water in the
urban centres of Zimbabwe, leading to the outbreak of the deadly
disease.

"We have been approached by twenty families from Budiriro in
Harare who have lost relatives in the current cholera outbreak. The chairman
of Chitungwiza Residents Association (CRA) has also approached
us.

"We are now compiling the names of relatives of victims who intent to
be covered under this law suit," said Rogers Matsikidze of Mucheche and
Matsikidze. "We are looking at well over a hundred cases."

Matsikidze
said ZINWA would have 21 days to admit or deny that it has failed to deliver
water to residents. It will be further argued that the responsibility for
water provision and administration be returned to the local
authorities.

ZINWA was launched soon after the controversial 2000
parliamentary elections. Many observers now view it as a dangerous and
costly political experiment.

Health and Child Welfare Minister Dr
David Parirenyatwa has admitted that 281 people have succumbed to cholera
from September to date. Independent health analysts say the disease has
killed at least 300.

Parirenyatwa said: "We are concerned about the
unavailability of water and as the minister responsible for health I am very
scared, especially during this rainy season."

The World Health
Organization (WHO) says over 6 000 people have been affected by cholera
since August.

Australia provides $8 million
emergency aid for the people of Zimbabwe

Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID); Government of
Australia

Date: 25 Nov 2008

AA 08 69

Australia will
provide a further $8 million of urgent food and other assistance to the
people of Zimbabwe in response to the escalating humanitarian
crisis.

The situation in Zimbabwe has become extremely grave, with
critical shortages of food and clean water.

Currently in Zimbabwe, 28
per cent of children under five are chronically malnourished and a cholera
outbreak has spread to all of the nation's eight provinces, killing around
300 people.

The World Food Programme (WFP) estimates that over five
million people - nearly half Zimbabwe's population - will require food aid
by early next year.

Australia will contribute:

- $6 million to
the World Food Programme; and

- $2 million to NGOs in partnership with
the UK's Department for International Development (DFID).

This
assistance brings Australia's support for Zimbabweans to nearly $20 million
in 2008-09.

Australia's contribution will assist those most vulnerable to
hunger, in particular orphans, those affected by HIV/AIDS and people
displaced by politically motivated violence or the policies of the Mugabe
regime. It will also assist with protecting livelihoods and improving access
to clean water, sanitation and hygiene.

The Australian Government
remains gravely concerned by the ongoing political crisis in Zimbabwe, where
people continue to be denied a democratic and representative
government.

The Government is providing desperately needed humanitarian
assistance to the people of Zimbabwe but will maintain targeted sanctions
against the brutal Mugabe regime which has caused so much of the
suffering.

Shops
turn away customers without forex

SOME shops in Bulawayo are no longer accepting
local currency, demanding payment in foreign currency for all purchases,
Business Chronicle has learnt.A survey yesterday revealed that some
shops licensed to sell in foreign currency were turning away customers
without the foreign currency.Kwikspar supermarket along 4th Avenue and Fife
Street and Green Acres have abandoned selling commodities in local currency
except for a few perishables that include milk, fruit and vegetables.A
section of goods sold in foreign currency only is packed with commodities,
mostly imported, while another part that is supposed to have commodities
sold in local currency is almost empty as only a few commodities such as tea
leaves can be found."We are not taking any Zimbabwean dollars for most
goods we have in this shop except for products such as milk and other
perishables. Otherwise all products that we import are sold in foreign
currency only," said an employee at Kwikspar supermarket.However, in
shops that were still accepting local currency, they pegged their prices
abnormally high in a strategy to discourage consumers from buying in local
currency."Only a few people are buying in local currency because it is
cheaper to buy in hard currency. Besides, it is also difficult for us to
calculate new Zimbabwean dollar prices on a daily basis because the rate
changes on a daily if not hourly basis," said an official at another
licensed retail outlet.Most Foreign Currency Licensed Warehouses and
Shops have since stopped the dual pricing system citing the fluctuation of
the Zimbabwean dollar against major currencies.Difficulties in accessing
cash at the banks have forced most consumers to mainly rely on hard currency
in paying for goods and services leading to an increase in the abuse of the
facility as some businesses illegally charge in hard currency.

Mujuru
allies ousted in Masvingo

MASVINGO - Sharp divisions have rocked Zanu-PF in Masvingo
following provincial elections which saw nearly all the old executive
members believed to be aligned to the former army commander general Solomon
Mujuru's faction being voted out of office.Members of the old executive,
all of them linked to the military, lost to party newcomers linked to the
Emmerson Mnangagwa camp as the party gears up for its national conference
next month.

The old executive led by retired major Alex Mudavanhu was
defeated in the elections on Sunday, while party newcomers, some of whom
were suspended from Zanu-PF for allegedly supporting the controversial
Tsholotsho plot, were voted into the provincial executive.

Mudavanhu
and Masvingo South legislator Walter Muzembi lost to former Gutu North
legislator Lovemore Matuke, who is now the party's new provincial chairman
in Masvingo.

Little-known Nyasha Chitumo of Zaka is the
new vice chairman after he outpolled former vice- chairman Retired Major
Clever Mumbengegwi

Tranos Huruva is the new political commissar while
Clemence Makwarimba takes over as provincial secretary.

Sylet Uyoyo
was elected new chairperson of the provincial women's league.

Uyoyo and
Makwarimba were once suspended from the party after they were linked to the
Tsholotsho meeting - alleged to have plotted against President Robert
Mugabe's ouster.

Six party provincial chairpersons for the party were
subsequently fired as a result of the meeting, alleged to have been
spearheaded by former information minister Jonathan Moyo, now an independent
MP representing Tsholotsho North constituency. Mnangagwa was linked to Moyo
and his fortunes fell in the aftermath of Tsholotsho.

Sunday's
elections created sharp divisions within the former ruling party's Masvingo
province. Some members of the old executive refused outright to leave
office.

Sources within Zanu-PF said that members of the old executive had
refused to hand over property including vehicles to the newly elected
members.

"We are not going to leave office because these elections were
not free and fair," said a member of the old executive who requested
anonymity.

"The whole thing was stage-managed because there were some
people in the party who did not want us because we are linked to the Mujuru
faction."

The old Zanu-PF Masvingo provincial executive was composed of
mainly retired soldiers allegedly linked to Mujuru, the retired army
commander who is the husband of Vice-President Joice Mujuru. Before the
March elections the retired army commander was widely regarded to be one of
the Zanu-PF heavy-weights who were expected to join former finance minister
Simba Makoni in his last-minute bid for the presidency.

His rival
Mnangagwa's star has been on the rise ever since and the events in Masvingo
over the weekend would to seem to confirm that as of now Mnangagwa has the
upper hand ahead of the Zanu-PF December conference.

Among those who were
in the old Masvingo executive are former chairman Mudavanhu, a retired army
major, Mumbengegwi, Claudius Makova, a retired colonel and retired brigadier
general Callisto Gwanetsa.

Elliot Manyika Zanu-PF secretary for the
commissariat on Monday dismissed any talk of division in the
party.

"Those who are crying foul are not our supporters," he said.
"Whenever there are elections in Masvingo there are always divisions and we
are saying to the losers they should work hand-in-glove with the new
executive.

"We are not going to hesitate to fire from the party people
who behave like our enemies"

Zanu-PF has been restructuring its
provincial executives throughout the country ahead of the party national
conference to be held next month in Bindura.

A case for dollarisation

Tuesday, 25 November 2008It is not a
secret that the Zimbabwean dollar has lost all its value.The Reserve
Bank of Zimbabwe has since had to remove thirteen zeros from the embattled
currency. A number of measures have been instituted in order to try and stop
this freefall. These measures include limiting cash withdrawals and the
BACOSSI family of interventions among others. They are not working.
Inflation is increasing at an increasing rate and the hapless ordinary
populace continues to suffer.It is high time Zimbabwe fully
dollarises officially or semiofficially.

Dollarisation involves
the inhabitants of a country using foreign currency in parallel to or
instead of their domestic currency. The term is not only applied to usage of
the United States dollar, but also generally to the use of any foreign
currency as the national currency. Semiofficial dollarisation is when
foreign currency is legal tender yet it plays second fiddle to the domestic
currency. When a country seizes to issue its own money, this becomes
official dollarisation. As it is, Zimbabwe has carried out the first steps
towards semiofficial dollarization, by introducing the concept of FOLIWARS.
This is hardly enough. More stable currencies such as the Rand and the
United States dollar need to be used to pay salaries and for day to day
transactions.

An argument put across by a number of people is that,
dollarisation should not take place because most people do not earn foreign
currency, so they would not be able to buy. The stark truth is that most
products in Zimbabwe are already being sold in foreign currency.
The Zimbabwe dollar price tag is only a front for the underlying foreign
currency price. If you walk into a spare parts shop and ask for a quotation,
the attended punches some numbers and then quotes you a Zimbabwe dollar
price. Two kilograms of sugar cost US$2 or 20 Rands.A shop selling in
Zimbabwe dollars will quote enough to be able to buy this foreign currency
during or at the end of each day. What this entails is that one actually
pays more using Zimbabwe dollars since shop owners put a premium on prices
in case rates move upwards. As such, people pay more if they buy goods
denominated in Zimbabwean dollars.

The current situation is only
benefiting foreign currency dealers and those who can access foreign
currency at the ridiculously low official exchange rate for resale. The fact
that not all shops have licenses allowing them to sell in foreign currency
means people have to covert foreign currency into local currency for day to
day purchases. Dealers charge commissions for their 'services'. This is so
lucrative that places such as Copa Cabana, Ximex mall and Roadport, are
always crowded with ever-increasing hordes of dealers with wads of high
denomination notes. Dollarisation will do away with the need to convert
money, and as such remove these middlemen.

Most people are now
paying their employees in 'kind'. This involves the use of fuel coupons and
groceries which are a better store of value than the Zimbabwean dollar as
they are proxies for foreign currency. The usual practice is to fix the
number of coupons and quantities of groceries and not the underlying US
dollar value. A person who was entitled to ten twenty litre coupons could
sell them for three hundred United States dollars. With the fall in world
fuel prices, only one hundred and fifty dollars can be realized from the
same quantity. This translates to a fifty percent reduction in earnings. Any
reduction in the price of the commodity results in the worker getting less.
If these salaries were paid in foreign currency, the worker would still be
able to maintain his or her earnings. Of course there is the likelihood of
the prices of fuel going up. I would be more comfortable with a situation
whereby one gets remunerated in foreign currency, then decides whether or
not to buy fuel coupons in order to speculate on the upward movement in
prices. The idea is to do everything possible to reduce or curb brain
drain.

In the past week, there has been a lot of threats and
'measures'coming from the Reserve Bank. The governor has gone on a
witch-hunt.Dr Gono is threatening to close down most of the banks
still operating in Zimbabwe. He is addressing symptoms and failing to ask
himself why South African or United States authorities are not complaining
that "ugly heads of indiscipline, corruption, fraudulent activities and
underhand manipulation of their money and capital markets have reached epic
proportions that are threatening to wipe the face of their economies," yet
they have more advanced fraudsters. The real reason is that the Zimbabwe
dollar has lost all its value. What is needed are clear, objective,
apolitical policy measures, and not stop-gap firefighting patches. One of
these policy measures involves dollarisation of the Zimbabwean
economy.

A question that would be asked is how to handle the issue
of individuals with substantial amounts of money in their bank accounts and
invested on the stock exchange. Most of this money came from the 'burning
process'. Salaries are in millions and billions, yet some people have
quintillions and sextillions in their accounts. If these people were to be
given access to that cash, its street value would be worth so many United
States dollars that the market would collapse instantly (that is if Gono's
30 year old presses can print such figures). This issue has to be looked at
before the dollarisation of the economy. The sheer volumes of proceeds from
'burning money' are such that it is very easy to differentiate between money
gotten through this means and that earned as salaries. An approach could be
to convert these volumes of money to their foreign currency equivalents,
using the transfer or cheque rates as at the dates when they got into the
account.These rates have been recorded by organizations such as
Zfn. This can be easily done using packages such as Microsoft Excel. On the
stock exchange, dually listed companies can be used to approximate the value
of all other counters.

Dollarisation is not all rosy. It has
been shown to plunge economies into debt and to stifle productive sectors.
The government would have to borrow in order to honour obligations such as
paying the Civil Service. However, the benefits which include reduction in
inflation and restoration of investor confidence outweigh the possible
pitfalls.Dollarisation coupled with Direct Foreign Investment (DFI)
could cancel out the effects of deficits. There are some legal and political
issues involved with using another nation's currency. Whether Zimbabwe
decides to dollarise officially or semiofficially, there will be need to
engage parties both within and without Zimbabwe. The best chance for this is
after a solution to our current political problems.

The Role of the Church and its Voice in Zimbabwe Today

I stand before you as
someone who was very much involved in the liberation of our country of
Zimbabwe from colonial rule, and we cherish the Swedish people who supported
us then and still hold us on the top of your solidarity list. You have never
given us up to this day although the relationship between our two nations is
n o longer what it was before and immediately after independence. In 1980
when we became independent we were convinced that the process to become a
democratic state had already started but we have since become known as a
nation that denies basic democratic principles and human
rights.

For more than 20 years Zimbabwe's main challenges have been
economic and political, and especially the abuse of power by those in
political leadership positions. There is a school of thought which argues
that such challenges are technical and all that is needed are technical
experts to fix Zimbabwe's social and political systems. Indeed technical
experts are needed and can help find solutions to salvage our nation from
this chronic mismanagement of our national resources.

But a
serious observer of the situation in Zimbabwe will soon find out that the
social, economic and political challenges we have today are only the tip of
the iceberg. We have a very deep spiritual and moral crisis in Zimbabwe
which explains why our nation has become so corrupt thriving on political
patronage. This has resulted in a society marred by all forms of injustice
without regard for human dignity,. a society whose political system
promotes lawlessness, violence, harassment, denial of food to the hungry to
name but a few;. a nation with many displaced persons - now around
500,000 in number;. a political system that has total disregard
for democratic principles as became obvious in the recent
elections;. in short: a system that has robbed its people of their
human rights.

Christians understand human rights as a God given
gift. Every person has a right to live a meaningful and purposeful life
including the right to food, shelter, healthcare, employment and education -
all these rights are being violated in Zimbabwe. Here lies the basis of our
challenge - it is both spiritual and moral.

Where the spiritual
and moral fibre of society are undermined, basic human values have also
ceased to exist. How else can it be explained that some of our people have
been mutilated during this year's election campaign, others were left to
die? People's homesteads and food storages were destroyed resulting in an
unbearable situation for the affected families. There is indeed need to
remind our people that there will be no peace in Zimbabwe until we all come
to a full realisation that no political solution can be found unless it
creates a system with a human face. That is why I repeat that we are faced
with a spiritual and moral crisis in Zimbabwe.

What is the mission
of the church in such a context?The mission of the church is to
announce the good news in any given situation -good news that
brings about freedom to the oppressed, food to the starving, medication to
the sick, shelter to the homeless, protection to the vulnerable children and
abused members of the community etc.

The human rights of the
majority of people in Zimbabwe are violated thereby denying them a
meaningful life. This majority lacks everything except the air they breathe
while on the other hand the minority who benefit from political patronage
have easy access to all the resources and material needs that make life
easier.

In actual fact Zimbabwe today is a lawless state where the
perpetrators of violence and even murder are never arrested or brought to
book. The judicial system itself is manipulated and leaves a lot to be
desired. The police are feared by the public because of their ruthlessness
and brutality as we in the Anglican Diocese of Harare continue to experience
whereby we are driven out from our church buildings during services and are
thus denied freedom of worship as our human right. When police officers
abuse the law they are supposed to protect, then you know that there is no
law anymore to protect the public. This all happens with full backing from
the political leadership some of whom are Anglicans but put their allegiance
to their political party above their allegiance to their church and their
Christian faith.

The church has the responsibility to remind
those in positions of power of their duty to respect and uphold human rights
of all its citizens regardless of social status, gender, religion, ethnicity
or political affiliation, and where these are denied the church becomes the
voice of the voiceless. However the voice of the church in Zimbabwe has not
been loud enough to condemn the evil system that our people experience
daily. Here I salute Archbp Pius Ncube who had the courage to speak out on
behalf of the voiceless. But you all know what sacrifice he had to make. And
to make it worse the church did not stand up in solidarity with him when
character assassination was meted out against him. The voice of the church
appears to be submerged by other noises which include violence,
intimidation, arrests and other forms of harassment. The voice of the church
has not been loud enough to condemn such behaviour. Some clergy who have
tried to speak out against the unjust political system have been seriously
warned and often silenced.

The church runs 80% of the schools
in the nation. But off late children have not been going to school or
teachers have refused to teach them because of poor wages paid by the
government, - and again the church has remained silent where it had the
right to speak out as a partner in education.

Similarly the
church has traditionally had a strong commitment to health but has not
condemned the total collapse of the health sector with major hospitals being
closed down. Should we in the church turn a blind eye on such an appalling
state of affairs? Indeed many people begin to ask: What is the role of the
church? Is it to support the government regardless of bad governance and
economic mismanagement? Certainly not!

The church has a prophetic
ministry to offer, and this is not usually popular with those in power. The
voice of the church should be heard -. Calling for justice in our
dealings with one another so that all members of society have equal
opportunities and access to all national resources. Calling for
freedom of speech and social harmony. Calling for genuine peace in
the midst of political polarisation. Being a voice that instils in
all persons a desire to lead a truthful life marked by integrity rather than
corruption. A voice that condemns Christians who apply double
standards - one for Sunday service in church and another for the rest of the
week accompanied by corrupt and unjust practises.

With these
few examples we may conclude by saying that the church has not listened to
God enough to pass on the message to his people.

The story of Moses
in the Old Testament at the site of the burning bush is a case in point:
Moses listened to God saying: I have indeed seen the misery of my people in
Egypt, I have heard them cry out because of the slave drivers, and I am
concerned: Go assemble the elders of Israel and say to them that I have
promised to bring you out of misery. We in the church are reminded of a God
who is not indifferent to the oppressed. He sees the misery of his people
who do not hear His voice. We do not seem to be sure about our calling, and
so we remain silent. In our silence we bury God's voice because it is
uncomfortable. We fear to face the Pharaoh in Egypt. We have adopted
survival skills. We even obey orders from a leadership we know to be working
against the will of God. But God wants us to love one another, care for each
other, and respect human life.

The gospel message which we are
expected to proclaim with a loud voice is about justice, peace, love and
truth. These themes do not appear to be heard loudly in our
nation.

During the March and June elections some of our people in
rural areas suffered serious atrocities, such as torture including murder.
Others were made homeless and became displaced persons. The main reason for
this torture and harassment being that these people did not vote for the
right party. Here is a classic example of the denial of human freedom of
choice. In this instance the voice condemning such atrocities came from
civic organisations whose members suffered arrests, and closure of their
offices - as happened to the Lawyers for Human Rights.

What the
people in Zimbabwe need today are individuals who stand up and condemn what
they see as unjust political system that limits people's freedom. The 20th
century history presents us with outstanding individuals who stood up for
human rights: Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Per Anger, Dietrich
Boenhoeffer, Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu - to name but a few. These
persons stood up as individuals to condemn evil as they saw it. Today we
need individuals with open eyes

. to see the maimed persons in
hospital with open wounds without medicine. to see the child
dying of hunger on the street. to see the displaced family sleeping
by the road side without shelter. to feel the pain inflicted on
humanity by fellow humans.

Unless the both the church and
individuals speak out with loud voices condemning an inhuman political
system that disregards the principles of democracy, dictatorship will be
with us for a long time to come. Elsewhere on the continent of Africa
dictatorships and evil ideologies have been dismantled by churches taking a
clear position. I am thinking here of the churches of South Africa, Kenya
and Malawi to mention but a few.

As we discuss issues related to
human rights, let us focus on each person as a child of God whose dignity is
God given, a dignity not derived from any human quality, not from a
particular race, age, sex or social status, let alone from the powers that
be, but a human dignity that is God given and belongs to God alone.

Dear
Professor Arthur Mutambara

I READ with interest the transcript of your interview with Violet
Gonda of SW Radio Africa.

"So while we back Mr. Tsvangirai in
pursuit of the Home Affairs Ministry we do not agree that not getting Home
Affairs is sufficient a condition to destroy the agreement, is sufficient a
condition to ruin our country over this matter."

I say it is
sufficient reason to destroy the agreement. It's a deal breaker. The MDC
must have the Ministry of Home affairs. The lives and safety of Zimbabwean
people depend on it.

Instead of maintaining law and order, the Ministry
of Home Affairs has become the base where unlawful acts are hatched and
implemented. Instead of protecting the lives of the people, the Ministry of
Home Affairs has itself participated in the killing of innocent
Zimbabweans.

In your interview with Violet Gonda, you belittled the
Ministry of Home Affairs, as if it was something irrelevant. "How can a
nation be ruined over a ministry?" you asked.

Let me tell you
Professor, in case your intelligent mind has forgotten, the function of the
Ministry of Home Affairs is the maintenance of law and order, and to protect
the lives and the property of the people of Zimbabwe.

Maybe you are one
of the lucky people who have not suffered violent beatings at the hands of
the Mugabe militia or the police.

Maybe none of your family, relatives,
or friends has suffered a similar fate.

If any of your relatives or
friends had been found dead in the ditches of Norton, or tossed by the
roadside, burnt and tortured, then perhaps you would be more firm about
which side you are on.

The Zimbabwean Ministry of Home Affairs is not
functional. It's a window dressing. It is there for one purpose only, to
serve Robert Mugabe and suppress the people of Zimbabwe.

The police
have repeatedly perpetuated brutal attacks on innocent people on the orders
of the ruling party. They have let killers roam free, and thieves ran
amok.

There has not been peace and order in Zimbabwe over the last ten
years, while Home Affairs has been under the control of President Mugabe. I
recommend that you read Gilbert Muponda's article "Reforming Home Affairs
critical for Zimbabwe's Economy."

Since the controversial land
distribution programme, the police have allowed war veterans and some
impostors to run around the country unchallenged invading white farms,
looting, beating and killing the farmers who dared to resist. Some of the
unfortunate victims were farmers who thought that they could fight this in a
court of law.

We have seen images of the police beating up and arresting
members of the opposition for no charge at all other than their political
affiliation. Members of the opposition have been detained by the police
without charge. The police instead have become the organ which the ruling
party uses to intimidate, suppress and harass the opposition.

I can't
imagine such a thing happening in a democratic country. It would be unheard
of for George Bush to order the arrest of a Democratic rival or a
critic.

Victims of political violence found themselves defenceless,
with nowhere to go, or report to. The police refused to act against
supporters of Mugabe. Zimbabweans have become victims of the very same
ministry which is supposed to protect them.

The life and future of
the people of Zimbabwe depend on the Ministry of Home Affairs. Zimbabweans
need to go to their beds and sleep well knowing that they are protected.
Zimbabweans need to sleep well knowing that no one will come and knock on
their door at midnight and take them away from their families for not
supporting Mugabe.

Many people have lost their lives over the last ten
years. The brazen killings and abductions were undertaken in full view of
both the public and the police and yet, the later did not do anything to
stop it.

It is evident that Mugabe doesn't want to relinquish his
instrument of terror. Without the police on his side or under his control,
who would go out and arrest those MDC members on trumped-up charges.
Without the police on his side, who would go out and beat up those WOZA
women when they demonstrate on the state of the economy.

It is
evident, Professor, that although you hold a PHD, you suffer from certain
deficiencies as far as reasoning is concerned. Or is it that you are just an
opportunist as some people suggest you are. Your rumblings which always
evoke rebuke, derision, disbelief and laughter from many people are a
sideline entertainment to the serious business of solving the Zimbabwean
crisis.

As long as Mugabe has control of Home Affairs, no real change
will ever come to Zimbabwe. No investors will come. No tourists will come.
Even Zimbabweans will not come back.

Mutambara must decide which side
he in on, some say. Even though Mugabe is vilified, at least people know
where he stands. What do you stand for Professor?

It's only in
Zimbabwe that people like you and Mugabe have a platform. Please stop
talking about the people. As far as I know, not many voted for you. Your
campaign is not about the people; it is about yourself.

If you were my
husband, I would be ashamed of you. In fact, I would put a muzzle on you.
Something tells me that you are a bully. I make this judgement based on the
transcript of your interview with Violet Gonda. You were disrespectful and
intimidating.

You have become the Sarah Palin of Zimbabwe.

Responses to “Dear Professor Arthur Mutambara”

Nada on November 24th, 2008 4:30 pm

I keep on hearing how intelligent Mutambara is - mainly from the man himself
who seems to have an obsessively high opinion of his intellectual capabilities.
I am not so convinced. Nothing I have read or heard from this man suggests
anything other average intelligence.

Indeed in some cases he appears a little stupid or very naive at best. And on
top of it when he is under pressure he seems very quick tempered, rude and
abusive. Not qualities that seem ideal for Deputy PM. Has anyone checked into
Mutambara’s background? He was away for a long time and is very vague about what
he did over this period. This might be something for a journalist to look
into.

Munyaradzi Munochiveyi on November 24th, 2008 4:33
pm

This is one of the most poignant and thorough analysis of the Mutambara
phenomenon in our current politics in Zimbabwe. Yes, not only has Mutambara
displayed amazing historical amnesia as to the role of the police in allowing
lawlessness which is largely responsible for the situation we are in right now,
but Mutambara also forgets that the basic; fundamental philosophy of
power-sharing is FAIRNESS.

In Mutambara’s rantings at our dear sister Violet he could not bring himself
to decently answer Violet’s questions on how he expects the MDC to co-manage
Home Affairs with Zanu-PF. He kept on harassing Violet, telling he that she
wasn’t “quick” or “smart” enough instead of answering questions. I agree that
such a politician who dodges difficult but important questions very much
resembles the Sarah Palin of Wasila, Alaska!!

Tawanda on November 24th, 2008 5:25 pm

Mutambara is the balancing power in Zimbabwe, if you need his help you have
to work with him and Tsvangirai should know that. Remember this guy was
persuaded by the MDC to become their leader when he was a Director in S.A

I wouldn’t mind if Mutambara takes over from President Mugabe than Morgan
Tsvangirai. Mr Tsvangirayi is busy travelling around the world instead of
agreeing with Mugabe to form GNU.

mthwakazi on November 24th, 2008 5:52 pm

Come on Jane, give Sarah Palin a break. She ran and energised a powerful
campaign for the Republicans. Well, l agree with you about AGO but l disagree
when you say he was bullying Violet. It was a fair interview. lf you think it
was abusive please listen to the George Charamba interview. Overall l agree with
your views that Mutambara is an opportunistic traitor. He can’t wait to be sworn
as a deputy PM and he knows only this agreement will give him a lifeline. He
does not have the interests of the people at heart as he
claims.

Obama and Zimbabwe

It must have been a
great relief to many world leaders when Barack Obama recently won the
presidential race. The many congratulatory calls that he received are
testament to this. But from Zimbabwe, there was little more than sullen
silence.

For years, Robert Mugabe has maintained that "neo-colonial"
powers, that is, the "white" governments of the UK and US, have been
plotting to usurp him. But with Zimbabwe slowly sliding towards civil war,
beset by cholera, with five million at risk of starvation, and a black man
now at the helm of the US, how long can this fiction be
maintained?

During the 1970s, my father, Jack Edward Jones, was among the
many mixed-race senators in the government of Rhodesia, as the country was
then known. He predicted with unerring precision what would happen if Mugabe
and his ilk came to power, the destruction of the country.

This was
based on the knowledge that the narrow and primitive mentality of tribal
politics would slash at the roots of democracy being nourished by the then
prime minister Ian Smith and senators such as my father.

It's a year
since Smith died, and that fine man must have been horrified to see what was
happening to his beloved country. He has been much maligned and falsely
accused of being racist by people who had little if any knowledge of the
country. Like many people who govern successfully, he was a hard-headed
pragmatist who took the long view, and proved all his critics wrong. He
hauled that country out of internecine tribal conflict to become the envy of
its corrupt, bankrupt neighbours. Mugabe has taken it back to the Dark Ages
by destroying what was once an advanced, all-round society and committing
genocide on his own people.

Barack Obama said last year: "For years,
it has been increasingly apparent that the Mugabe government is interested
only in its own survival and enrichment, not the welfare of the people of
Zimbabwe."

How it must irritate Mugabe to see a black man in power in the
US, who recognises his regime for what it is, corrupt, greedy and criminal;
and who can't be accused of racism.